Hardware Retailing The Industry's Source for Insights and Information
Do it Best Corp. used its May market, held May 17-19 in Indianapolis, to highlight retail growth opportunities for its members. The co-op placed particular importance on the growth and expansion of core categories, the growth of new categories and the centralized support of retail programs for its members.
With attendance up 15 percent from last May’s market, and sales for the Friday Sneak Peek buying event totaling over $7.5 million in 90 minutes, the attitude from the market was optimistic and aggressive about the future.
What’s Popular
One of the most popular areas was the New Idea Exhibit featuring home automation, which continues to become more popular with consumers. The assortments, ranging from home security to energy savings and lighting, allow homeowners to run their homes with the touch of a button, often from their smartphone or tablet, when they’re away from home.
“There’s even a meat thermometer that you can operate from your smartphone,” says Randy Rusk, communications director for Do it Best Corp. “You can check your grill and see how your food’s doing while you are inside. Or if you leave the house and can’t remember if you turned off the space heater, some new heaters sync with your smartphone so you can check from there and make sure it’s off.”
Down on the Farm
Another area of focus for the market included the farm and ranch category, which has seen rapid growth over the past several years and continues to grow quickly in the industry. With more than 5,000 unique items in 5,000 square feet of space, there were plenty of products to choose from, both for retailers who wanted to get into the category or those who already have a farm and ranch department in their store, but wanted to add to their assortment.
It’s all part of the co-op’s goal to provide additional growth opportunities to their members. “As we do at each market, our No. 1 goal is to provide our members a broad array of opportunities to strengthen and grow their businesses, whether it’s through incredible savings and discounts, a wide selection of free, world-class training sessions from industry and Do it Best Corp. subject matter experts, or by providing the forum to share best practices with their fellow members,” says Do it Best Corp. President and CEO Bob Taylor.
Retailers were specifically looking for new categories to help them expand and grow their services—a sign of optimism and health.
Adam Hendrix and Brandin Lowry of Chic Lumber in St. Peters, Missouri, were walking the show floor to see what was out there, focusing especially on kitchen and bath and home organization products.
“Home organization continues to become more popular,” says Lowry.
“Kitchen and bath seems to be the hot point in our store this year,” says Hendrix. “But we’re also walking the floor and just seeing what’s here. We’re always looking around. So far, the market is going well.”
“This is one of the most exciting markets I’ve been to,” says Rich Lynch, vice president of marketing for Do it Best Corp. “The atmosphere is inspiring, and the retailers are optimistic.. There’s a good buzz there on the market floor.”
Rusk agrees. “We have more than 50 new vendors at this market, and key categories continue to grow,” he says. “We’re seeing our retailers bringing more of their employees to the markets. These are all good indicators that, after a sluggish winter, there’s a pent-up demand to get back to business.
A Centralized Focus on Growth
The co-op also continues to work to offer opportunities to its current retailers who want to add new locations or increase its offerings at existing locations.
“We have retailers who know how to do things well,” says Lynch. “Now, our goal is to provide them with opportunities to do things well three or four more times over.”
Do it Best recently rolled out a new online catalog for members, currently in the beta testing stage, that allows retailers to find and order products online. “It’s super-fast and very graphics-intensive,” says Rusk. “You can type ‘hammer’ in the search screen and get all the results and photos. We’ve invested a lot behind-the-scenes to make it easy for our members to use the website.”
Beta testing will be completed in July, and by October, the catalog will be available for mobile devices.
Do it Best has also begun to look closely at the analytics from the inventory & pricing dashboard, which is about three years old.
“It’s really taken off in the last year,” says Rusk. “It’s a service our members can choose to participate in, and those who do get a robust set of analytics to help grow their businesses. For example, they can look at the top five selling smoke alarms at stores in markets like theirs, and if they see they aren’t selling one or two of those brands, they may choose to start stocking them.”
